Rebecca Blackwell joined the AP as West Africa photographer in 2007, before moving to the Mexico City bureau in 2014. From her West Africa base in Dakar, Senegal, Rebecca covered news stories across the African continent, including conflicts in Ivory Coast and Central African Republic, the dangers of childbirth in rural Guinea-Bissau, a Somalian refugee crisis, and more elections and coups than she can count.

A member of an armed neighborhood defense squad, which residents say is not anti-balaka, but local Christian residents protecting themselves, carries a machete as he walks near a roadblock in Bangui, Central African Republic, Tuesday, December 31, 2013. (Photo by Rebecca Blackwell/AP Photo)

Two-year-old, Aden Salaad, looks up toward his mother, unseen, as she bathes him in a tub at a Doctors Without Borders hospital, where Aden is receiving treatment for malnutrition, in Dagahaley Camp, outside Dadaab, Kenya, Monday, July 11, 2011. (Photo by Rebecca Blackwell/AP Photo)

In this Wednesday, July 30, 2014 photo, a young Honduran migrant who didn't want his face to appear in photos hides behind a painting he found in a guard shack, while waiting with a group of migrants for a northbound train, in Huehuetoca, outside Mexico City. The migrant was one of three young Honduran brothers traveling north together in hopes of finding work in the U.S. Days earlier, they said, they had been robbed along with two dozen other passengers while riding a train. (Photo by Rebecca Blackwell/AP Photo)

Students attend an Arabic class at the Al-Haraiman French-Arabic School in Yaounde, Cameroon Monday, March 16, 2009. (Photo by Rebecca Blackwell/AP Photo)

A young neighborhood resident carries makeshift weapons, as he returns from a camp for the displaced at Mpoko Airport to fetch household goods from the Garaba neighborhood, in Bangui, Central African Republic, on New Year's Day, Wednesday, January 1, 2014. (Photo by Rebecca Blackwell/AP Photo)

A vendor wears his stock around his neck as he markets crosses to the faithful waiting to see the convoy of Pope Benedict XVI pass, in Yaounde, Cameroon Wednesday, March 18, 2009. (Photo by Rebecca Blackwell/AP Photo)

A member of the Air Force carrying a predatory bird looks toward the President as they march past the National Palace during an annual Independence Day parade by Mexico's Armed Forces, in central Mexico City, Mexico, Tuesday, September 16, 2014. Mexico is marking the 204th anniversary of its independence from Spain. (Photo by Rebecca Blackwell/AP Photo)

Onlookers gather around a struggling beached whale in the Yoff neighborhood of Dakar, Senegal Wednesday, May 21, 2008. Residents worked Wednesday morning to save some of the more than 80 whales that were stranded on the beach Tuesday night. This whale was successfully towed out to sea by a fishing boat, though at least 20 others lay dead on the beach by midday Wednesday. (Photo by Rebecca Blackwell/AP Photo)

Girls stand near a house built on top of a dune in the poor neighborhood of Hay Sakin, in Nouakchott, Mauritania Friday July 17, 2009. (Photo by Rebecca Blackwell/AP Photo)

Supporters of opposition leader Alassane Ouattara burn tires in protest following the results of the election, in the Marcory neighborhood of Abidjan, Ivory Coast, Friday, December 3, 2010. (Photo by Rebecca Blackwell/AP Photo)

In this September 24, 2013 photo, Quranic students known as talibes sleep together in the crowded room that serves as their classroom and living quarters, at a daara, or Quranic school, in the Medina Gounass suburb of Dakar, Senegal. (Photo by Rebecca Blackwell/AP Photo)

A young Muslim girl attends a Quranic lesson in a one-room madrasa in the Dar es-Salam neighborhood of Bouake, the former rebel capital of northern Ivory Coast, Tuesday, November 2, 2010. (Photo by Rebecca Blackwell/AP Photo)

An infant being treated for severe malnutrition rests in a sling at his mother's side at a hospital operated by the International Rescue Committee, in Hagadera Camp outside Dadaab, Kenya, Saturday, July 9, 2011. (Photo by Rebecca Blackwell/AP Photo)

In this Tuesday, May 1, 2012 photo, Maryam Sy comforts her 2-year-old son Aliou Seyni Diallo, the youngest of nine, after a neighbor gave him dry couscous to stop him from crying with hunger, in the village of Goudoude Diobe, in the Matam region of northeastern Senegal. (Photo by Rebecca Blackwell/AP Photo)

A cloth seller waits in hope of selling some pieces to a wholesale buyer, as sellers said their business was suffering following the recent coup, at the Grand Market in Bamako, Mali Saturday, March 31, 2012. (Photo by Rebecca Blackwell/AP Photo)

A man stands in the door of a barber shop as French and African Union forces conduct a joint patrol in the Fouh neighborhood of Bangui, Central African Republic, Saturday, January 4, 2014. (Photo by Rebecca Blackwell/AP Photo)

A ray swims over a bed of coral at the Inbursa Aquarium in Mexico City, Friday, May 30, 2014. Mexican magnate Carlos Slim inaugurated the underground aquarium, one of the biggest in Latin America. (Photo by Rebecca Blackwell/AP Photo)

In this October 10, 2013 photo, Aida Diallo, whose ten-year-old son Bamba was killed when a fire struck the Dakar shack where he was sleeping along with other Quranic students, sits in her one-room home in the village of Ndame, Senegal. Bamba's older brother Cheikhou, 13, managed to escape the fire which killed Bamba and three of their cousins. (Photo by Rebecca Blackwell/AP Photo)

In this Friday, June 20, 2014 photo, Central American migrants wait atop the freight train they had been traveling north on, as it starts to rain after the train suffered a minor derailment outside Reforma de Pineda, Chiapas state, Mexico. (Photo by Rebecca Blackwell/AP Photo)

An African Union peacekeeper carries an elderly Cameroonian woman, too frail to walk, to a military vehicle shuttling Cameroonian citizens to the airport for an evacuation flight, in Bangui, Central African Republic, Friday, December 27, 2013. Military escorts shuttled nationals of Chad and Cameroon to the airport Friday to board evacuation flights, as French troops stepped in to help Muslims fleeing north by road make it safely through hostile areas. (Photo by Rebecca Blackwell/AP Photo)

In this September 24, 2013 photo, a talibe begs for change from a driver stopped at a gas station, in the Medina Gounass suburb of Dakar, Senegal. (Photo by Rebecca Blackwell/AP Photo)

A French soldier talks to curious children as he mans a roadblock in the Miskine neighborhood of Bangui, Central African Republic, Monday, January 6, 2014. (Photo by Rebecca Blackwell/AP Photo)